Photo: Chicago SCI
smart
Sister cities
Mexico City and Chicago signed an historic city-to-city trade agreement in 2013
How sister city partnerships can play
a new role in a global economy
The concept of twin towns and sister cities was conceived after the Second World War to rebuild diplomatic
relationships and reconcile citizens through cultural and educational exchanges. But in the modern era,
Jonathan Ballantine reveals how sister city partnerships are being increasingly used to forge strategic
trade and economic ties
For ease of simplification this article uses the term
sister city to embrace all types of partnerships being
explored by cities. Differences in terminology occur
mainly due to regional preferences but may also
indicate the type of relationship being pursued by
the two cities. In the UK, the terms ‘twin towns’ or
twinning are most commonly used. In Europe, the
term most commonly used is ‘twin towns’ but also
in use are the terms ‘partnership towns’, ‘partner
towns’ and ‘friendship towns’. Whereas in North
America and Asia Pacific, the term ‘sister city’ is
most commonly used, and is the term encouraged
by the global association Sister Cities International.
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M
ost UK visitors to France have
seen the sign when you get
off the ferry telling you that
Boulogne is twinned with Folkestone
in the UK, La Plata in Argentina and
Zweibrücken in Germany but beyond
providing gems of trivia such as the
distance needed to reach the twin city,
is there really a role for sister cities in a
modern, global, digital economy?
As well as claiming that sister
city relationships do not benefit the
cities involved, detractors say that the
programmes are only used by elected
officials to justify expensive overseas
travel or to gain political support
within a community.
In the 1950s and 1960s, there was a
clear purpose for sister city partnerships–
the world was emerging from the chaos
and destruction of the Second World
War and there was a need for peace,
reconciliation and diplomacy through
educational and cultural linkages.
Remember also this was a time of limited
communication, travel and immigration
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engagement and mutual understanding.
And this includes companies. There
are now over 30 Japanese companies
investing in San Antonio including
Toyota Motors.
“We have a 26 year-old relationship
with Kumamoto of Japan which has
enabled us to build mutual trust between
the two cities–a vital ingredient for
successful business development,” says
Dowlatshahi. “The [Japanese] companies
contribute significantly to our local
economy through job creation and
increased productivity.”
Sister cities: a brief history
In Europe, agreements between cities tend to occur
from the top down when the mayors of two cities
meet and agree to become partners. In the US,
however, they are more likely to be developed at
the grass roots level when individuals get together
to form a sister city committee and request that
their local government forms an official partnership.
Historically, sister city partnerships are those that
begin between two cities that have something in
common–be it population size, typology or even
just sharing the same name. External organisations
such as Sister Cities International in the US or The
Council of European Municipalities and Regions in
Europe act as facilitators for developing partnerships
between municipalities.
The first recorded modern twinning agreement
was between Keighley and Poix-du-Nord in Nord,
France, in 1920 following the end of the First
World War. The practice was continued after the
Second World War as a way to promote peace
and reconciliation amongst former enemies. For
example, Coventry in the UK was twinned with
Stalingrad in Russia and later with the German
city of Dresden, as all three cities had seen heavy
bombardment during the war.
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and most people only focused on their
local community, while anything else
was viewed as foreign (read alien) and
therefore not to be trusted. “Since our
creation in 1951, our main aim has
consisted in helping citizens to reconcile
after the war through town twinning
partnerships,” says Georgina Mombo,
Press Officer at the Council of European
Municipalities and Regions in Brussels.
Today we live in a world where
people can communicate, travel and
migrate to all corners of the world and
increasingly, the citizens of major cities
such as London, New York and Tokyo
have more in common with each other
than with people from rural areas.
While sister city relationships
have traditionally been developed for
diplomatic, cultural or educational
purposes, in today’s economic climate
there is a growing need for cities
to expand and leverage sister city
partnerships for economic development.
“For the last 20 years we have been
working to go beyond cultural and
symbolic partnerships, by promoting
modernised partnerships serving as a
tool for municipalities and towns to face
mutual issues: economic development,
water management, waste recycling,
the improvement of social services or
language exchanges,” adds Mombo.
Adam Kaplan, Membership
Director at Sister Cities International
in Washington DC, says that in late
2009 a number of members were not
renewing their membership in an effort
to cut public spending but that over
the last two years, the same cities were
now coming back and asking Sister
Cities International how their sister
city relationships could be expanded.
“Over the last five years there has
been significant interest from our
members as to how these partnerships
can be expanded towards economic
development,” says Kaplan.
Building trust is often cited as a
key component in business decisions
and according to Shahrzad (Sherry)
Dowlatshahi, Head of International
Relations in the US city of San Antonio,
the sister city relationship sets the
foundation for diverse participants from
each city to come together to promote
Adam Kaplan, Membership Director, Sister Cities International
Cities driving world economy
It is clear that cities operate and compete
in a different world today than they did
50 years ago. By 2030, it is projected
that the global urban population will
reach 75 percent, and over 90 percent
of global GDP will result from urban
activity. According to research by
McKinsey, one-third of the world’s
GDP will come from just 100 cities. At
the heart of this change is globalisation
which is increasing trade flows between
regions, and is shifting economic power
towards the emerging economies of
China and India, or more accurately,
the cities of these regions. “It’s cities and
not nations that are driving the global
economy, and are the engines for growth
In North America, the first city to establish a sister
city relationship was Toledo, Ohio, which partnered
with its Spanish namesake in 1931. The US sister
city programme formally began in 1956 when
President Dwight D. Eisenhower proposed a new
initiative of city cooperation. In 1967, Sister Cities
International became a separate corporation due
to the growth and popularity of the US programme.
Today it is a non-profit citizen diplomacy network
that creates and strengthens partnerships between
communities in the US and other countries, through
the establishment of new sister cities and the
support of existing relationships. Within Europe, town
twinning receives political and financial support by
the European Union through the ‘Europe for citizens’
programme. The Council of European Municipalities
and Regions works closely with the European
Commission to promote projects, activities and
exchanges in the framework of twinning agreements.
through productivity, innovation and
job creation”, says David Adam, Founder
of Global Cities which provides strategic
advice to cities on positioning, branding
and investment opportunities.
Cities were born because merchants
gathered to sell spices, silks, and teas.
Cities, not nations, enhanced trade by
providing the physical space, constant
interaction, and economic specialisation u
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life and sustainable development. A key
finding from the report is that there is a
strong correlation between the quality
of a city’s institutions and its overall
competitiveness. “If cities are to reach
their potential, governance models and
political structures must be aligned with
economic dynamism,” comments Adam.
But given the right governance
models, can the opportunities for trade
partnerships be facilitated more actively
through sister cities?
Photo: BMPP
needed to facilitate exchange between
previously isolated actors.
In 2012, Brookings and JPMorgan
Chase launched the Global Cities
Initiative (GCI), aimed at helping US cities
strengthen their regional economies by
becoming more competitive in the global
marketplace. “We believe that cities need
to get back to their roots, which is to be
centres of trade and commerce,” says Amy
Liu, senior fellow, and co-director of the
Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program.
To support this aim, GCI publishes
a regular Global MetroMonitor, which
tracks the economic performance of the
300 largest world cities. The monitor
revealed that 75 percent of the fastestgrowing metropolitan economies in 2012
were from developing regions, and that
metro areas outperformed their countries
on employment growth in 2012.
Global economic factors such as
globalisation and urbanisation are
opening up new markets, intensifying
competition and adding new layers
of complexity to global supply chains.
Therefore it is critical for city leaders
to understand how global economic
factors can affect the competitiveness
of their city and determine how their
unique assets can service the impacts of
globalisation so that they can become
beneficiaries of new trade flows, direct
investment, job creation and innovation
and remain an attractive proposition in
a world economy.
“We are now living in the Urban Age
and cities are the most important unit
of social and economic reproduction
because they supply the most important
component in today’s globally connected
economic system: people,” says Adam.
By leveraging their unique assets and
identifying opportunities to collaborate
with global cities around specialised
expertise, highly skilled labour, location
and connectivity, city leaders can find
their competitive niche to thrive in
the global economy. According to the
HotSpots 2025 report produced by
the Economist Intelligence Unit and
Citigroup, competitiveness of cities
must be viewed as a holistic concept that
embraces a number of indicators such
as economic size, growth, regulatory
environment, human capital, quality of
Amy Liu, Co-Director, Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program
enhance their global trade position,
investing in the key assets for driving
trade or building structured relationships
with trading partners to increase their
global competitiveness,” says Liu.
In late 2013, the cities of Chicago
and Mexico City entered into a first-ofits-kind city-to-city trade agreement.
“The City of Chicago and Mexico City
are building upon the strong ties–both
cultural and economic–that already exist
between the two cities by cooperating
in the areas of FDI, trade, innovation,
tourism and education with the goal
to increase employment, expand
advanced industries and strengthen
global competitiveness,” says Adrienne
Tongate, Deputy Director of Chicago
Sister Cities International.
This initiative is being facilitated by
the Brookings Institute’s Global Cities
Initiatives and the cities are utilising
partner organisations, including World
Business Chicago (Chicago’s not-forprofit economic development agency),
Chicago Sister Cities International, the
Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce and
ProMexico (the Mexican Government
institution in charge of strengthening
Mexico’s participation in the international
economy) to help execute the agreement.
“It was very important to all parties
that this become a substantive, active
partnership, not a ceremonial agreement
“Forward-thinking metro leaders are increasingly
adopting strategies to enhance their global trade
position, investing in the key assets for driving trade
or building structured relationships with trading
partners to increase their global competitiveness”
Amy Liu, Co-Director, Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program
Current trends are signalling a shift
in the focus of sister city partnerships
towards economic development, where
city leaders and economic trade bodies are
exploring ways to help their local businesses
take advantage of growth opportunities
emerging from developing countries.
“Forward-thinking metro leaders
are increasingly adopting strategies to
that was signed and then filed for
perpetuity,” says Tongate.
According to Liu this is not a typical
sister cities cultural exchange pact. “It
is a series of joint initiatives in trade,
innovation, and education that will
increase employment, expand advanced
industries, and strengthen their overall
global competitiveness.” The mayors
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“It’s one of the fastest growing in our
network,” says Adam Kaplan of Sister
Cities International.
Partnering for mutual benefit
Through sister city partnerships,
city leaders can find new growth
opportunities. However, finding the
right partner is complex. According to
McKinsey it is a misconception that
megacities have been driving global
growth and their research shows how
to identify the potential for synergies
between two cities. “For a long time city
twinning was considered to be a fruitless
activity. However, the need to exchange
best practice in models of governance,
economic growth, and sustainable living
when viewed in conjunction with the
importance of understanding cultural
differences of the emerging countries
such as China, means that those cities
who signed sister city partnership
agreements with second and third tier
Photo: ringo380
of both these cities recognise the value
of strategic partnerships in a global
economy, and have leveraged existing
sister city relationships to formalise
trade agreements.
By taking their partnership to the
next level, they have raised the bar for
sister city relationships across the world.
Through Chicago and Mexico City’s
trade partnership, other cities can follow
suit, by customising strategies with
their global partners that make most
economic sense for them. “There has
already been a great deal of information
sharing. Chicago will host a delegation
from Mexico City this spring led by their
Ministers of Economic Development
and Tourism, along with Mexico Citybased businesses and entrepreneurs,”
says Tongate.
Over 25 years ago, the City of
Portland and the City of Suzhou in
China, signed a sister city partnership
focused on developing cultural links and
an arts-exchange programme. During
a quarter of a century, exports and
investment have entered the relationship
and Portland and Suzhou won a 2014
US-China Sister Cities Award in the
‘economy and trade’ category. The award
was granted by Sister Cities International
in recognition for outstanding
achievements in trade and economic
exchange. Robert Fraser, a board member
of the Portland-Suzhou Sister City
Association, says: “We’re geared more
toward investment, trade and export,
nowadays but we’re not going to leave
behind education and culture.”
Another US/China sister city
partnership that has been leveraged for
economic development is that between
the cities of Houston and Shenzhen. The
city of Shenzhen has been working to
promote more innovative technologies
and become a leader in the financial
and high tech sector. The city has grown
from a small fishing village to a megacity
with a GDP of US$200 billion. Just as
Shenzhen has grown into one of China’s
major cities in the past 30 years, the
city of Houston has emerged as a world
leader in energy. China now occupies
third place, behind Mexico and Japan,
in the number of US sister-city and state
relationships with communities abroad.
US city Houston has formed strong economic ties with Shenzhen in China
cities with populations of between
150,000 to 10 million will account for
50 percent of global growth by 2025. As
Saskia Sassen, of Columbia University,
states there is no perfect global city
because different companies prefer
different networks of cities, and this
explains why there are so many more
global cities today.
If you look at the sister cities list for
most US cities, there are lots of small
cities that are not natural partners for
an economic partnership. “Not all sister
cities relationships are ripe candidates
for an economic partnership so, cities
must evaluate wisely which existing
sister city partnership is a ripe platform
for mutual economic growth,” says Liu.
Choosing the right partnership
requires detailed market analysis
combined with city-specific information
Chinese cities many years ago will reap
economic benefit long into the 21st
century,” comments Adam.
These pacts should not just
be municipality-to-municipality
partnerships. Cities have an opportunity
to strategically align fragmented bilateral partnerships–city-to-city, port-toport, business-to-business, chamber-tochamber, university-to-university–into a
more cohesive, comprehensive approach
for boosting shared growth across two
markets. “It’s metro areas, not cities,
that are the economic unit of the global
economy and cities need to act as heads
of regional networks that create the
conditions for high quality economic
growth,” says Liu. It is time for cities to
focus less on how far to reach their sister
city and more on the value of the trade
they have created with it. 
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